Why Break the Habit of a Lifetime? Rethinking the Roles of Intention, Habit, and Emotion in Continuing Information Technology Use

One of the most welcome recent developments in Information Systems scholarship has been the growing interest in individuals’ continuing use of information technology well after initial adoption, known in the literature as IT usage, IT continuance, and post-adoptive IT usage. In this essay, we explore the theoretical underpinnings of IS research on continuing IT use. Although the IS literature on continuing IT use emphasizes the role of habitual behavior that does not require conscious behavioral intention, it does so in a way that largely remains faithful to the theoretical tradition of planned behavior and reasoned action. However, a close reading of reference literatures on automatic behavior (behavior that is not consciously controlled) and the influences of emotion on behavior suggests that planned behavior and reasoned action may not provide the best theoretical foundation for the study of continuing IT use. As a result, we call for empirical research that directly compares and contrasts the consensus theory of continuing IT use with rival theories that place much greater emphasis on unplanned and unreasoned action.